MVC .NET Core Area

MVC .NET Core Area

Here we look at the MVC .NET Core Area.

The MVC Area in .NET Core helps us to organise our folder structure of files, specifically the Models, Controllers and Views. So if you'd like to group certain Models, Views and Controllers into groups, as in parent folders, the .NET Core MVC Area facility allows us to do this whilst maintaining the functionality of the Models, Views and Controllers.

Add an MVC .NET Core Area

In order to get the Area working in .NET Core 3.1 I had to do the following in Startup.cs:

app.UseEndpoints(endpoints =>
{
     endpoints.MapControllerRoute(
         name: "MyArea",
         pattern: "{area:exists}/{controller=Home}/{action=Index}/{id?}");

     endpoints.MapControllerRoute(
         name: "default",
         pattern: "{controller=Home}/{action=Index}/{id?}");

     endpoints.MapRazorPages();
});

Note the .MapRazorPages call was only needed for ASP.NET Core Identity, so you may not need that, but hopefully useful if you do.

Additionally on the Controller I needed to added the [Area] attribute:

namespace High_Flying.Areas.Editor.Controllers
{
     [Area("Editor")]
     public class HomeController : Controller
     {
         private readonly ILogger _logger;

The file structure looks like this:

Areas
     Editor
         Controllers
             HomeController
         Data
         Models
         Views
             Home
                 Index.cshtml